When a movie like District 9 comes along, I think about people who always complain that nothing new is released anymore. This was just straight crazy from the bell. But instead of feeling ridiculous, it worked! This was a believable documentary about humanity imprisoning aliens because we want their weapons. Damn, we suck.
Shooting movies as pseudo-documentaries has become common nowadays but when it is done right it still feels different. Maybe it was the audacity of playing alien concentration camp completely straight but the documentary style fit District 9. The shaky handheld camera helped cover up any shortcomings in the budget. The aliens were the standard buggy looking creatures but the animation was so detailed it set them apart from other movies. The Prawns came across as little more than scavengers that weren’t all that intelligent. And since they were entirely CGI creations, it was all up to the animators to show this. Just unbelievable work was done here.
The parallels for this story are obvious and completely depressing. This is the world we live in and what would probably happen if aliens were stranded on earth. The fact that the ghetto the prawns were caged in was an actual area of Johannesburg that existed and people lived in at one time. Who knew that a movie where aliens are scrounging for cat food can make you depressed?
Oh yeah and then there was cool shit that blew up and fancy pants alien weapons, so there was a bit of everything here. Hopefully District 9 makes a shitload of money and there can be empirical proof that something as new and different as this can be big-time successful.
9 out of 10
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